using eclipse

[dasRatsel]

guten tag:
I just completed my first season as team coder and have concluded that mplab is the fruit of the devil. In Atlanta I went to the Advanced C conference (y'all did an awsome job with that by the way) and noticed when they brought up some code they used eclipse, way cool. So, i was wondering how to do that - i've been tinkering round a bit but my lack of knowledge is leading me in circles. All i know is that i need an editor a linker an assembler etc... but i dont know how much of that is taken care of by eclipse and how much i need from the stuff first gave us .. . . .. so if somebody could help explain what all i need, and what exactly it does i'd be much abliged. thanks
~ Xavier